FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE CONTACT Lisa Tawil, ITVS 415-356-8383
[email protected] Mary Lugo 770-623-8190
[email protected] Cara White 843-881-1480
[email protected] For downloadable images, visit pbs.org/pressroom/ SEED: The Untold Story Premieres on Independent Lens Monday, April 17, 2017 on PBS Online Streaming Begins April 18 As many irreplaceable seeds near extinction, SEED reveals the story of passionate seed keepers as they wage a David and Goliath battle against chemical seed companies, defending a 12,000-year food legacy (San Francisco, CA) — Worshipped and treasured since the dawn of humankind, few things on Earth are as miraculous and vital as seeds. SEED: The Untold Story follows passionate seed keepers intent on protecting our 12,000 year- old food legacy. Produced and directed by Taggart Siegel and Jon Betz (The Real Dirt on Farmer John, Queen of the Sun: What are the Bees Telling Us?), the film premieres on Independent Lens Monday, April 17, 2017, 10:00-11:00 PM ET (check local listings) on PBS. In the last century, 94% of our seed varieties have disappeared. This once abundant seed diversity — Will Bonsall, seed saver and organic farmer from Maine. painstakingly created by ancient farmers and gardeners over Credit: Collective Eye Films countless millennia — has been drastically winnowed down to a handful of mass-produced varieties. Under the spell of industrial “progress” and corporate profits, family farmsteads have given way to mechanized agribusinesses sowing genetically identical crops on a massive scale. But without seed diversity, crop diseases rise and empires fall.